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Robert Greene (poet)
Robert Greene (baptized 11 July 1558 - 3 September 1592) was an English poet and playwright. Life Overview Greene was born at Norwich, and studied at Cambridge, where he graduated A.B. He was also incorporated at Oxford in 1588. After travelling in Spain and Italy, he returned to Cambridge and took an A.M. Settling in London, he was 1 of the wild and brilliant crew who passed their lives in fitful alternations of literary production and dissipation, and were the creators of the English drama. He has left an account of his career in which he calls himself "the mirror of mischief." During his short life about town, in the course of which he ran through his wife's fortune, and deserted her soon after the birth of her 1st child, he poured forth tales, plays, and poems, which had great popularity. In the tales, or pamphlets as they were then called, he turns to account his wide knowledge of city vices. His plays, including The Scottish History of James IV, and Orlando Furioso, which are now little read, contain some fine poetry among a good deal of bombast; but his fame rests, perhaps, chiefly on the poems scattered through his writings, which are full of grace and tenderness. Greene died from the effects of a surfeit of pickled herrings and Rheinish wine. His extant writings are much less gross than those of many of his contemporaries, and he seems to have given signs of repentance on his deathbed, as is evidenced by his last work, A Groat's worth of Wit bought with a Million of Repentance. In this curious work occurs his famous reference to Shakespeare as "an upstart crow beautified with our feathers." His tales are written under the influence of Lyly, whence he received from Gabriel Harvey the nickname of "Euphues' Ape."John William Cousin, "Greene, Robert," A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature, 1910, 168-169. Web, Jan. 20, 2018. He is arguably the first professional author in England. Greene published in many genres including autobiography, plays, and romances, while capitalizing on a scandalous reputation. Youth and education Greene was born in Norwich in 1558; however, biographers disagree whether Greene was the son of a humble saddler or of a more prosperous innkeeper with landowning relatives. He took his B.A. in 1580 and his M.A. in 1583 at St John's College, Cambridge, and became an M.A. of Oxford in 1588. Greene claimed to have married a well-off woman named Doll, and to have later abandoned her, after spending a considerable sum of her money.L. H. Newcomb, ‘Greene, Robert (bap. 1558, d. 1592)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 Career In London, Greene managed to support himself through his own writing. He lived as a notorious intellectual and rascal, cultivating this reputation himself in pamphlets describing his adventures amid the seamier characters of Elizabethan England, and through a memorable appearance, with fashionable clothing and his pointy red beard. Greene's plays include The Scottish History of James IV, Alphonsus, and his greatest popular success, Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay (c. 1589), as well as Orlando Furioso, based on Ludovico Ariosto's epic poem. He may also have had a hand in numerous other plays, and may have written a second part to Friar Bacon, (which may survive as John of Bordeaux). In addition to his acknowledged plays, Greene has been proposed as the author of a range of other dramas, including The Troublesome Reign of King John, George a Greene, Fair Em, A Knack to Know a Knave, Locrine, Selimus, and Edward III, among others – even Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus.''Logan and Smith, pp. 81-5. He died on 3 September 1592, from what Nashe called a "banquet of Rhenish wine and pickled herring," perhaps having written on his death bed the famous ''Groatsworth of Wit Bought with a Million of Repentance and having dispatched a letter to his wife asking her to forgive him and to settle his debts. Writing By 1583 Greene had begun his literary career with the publication of a long romance, Mamillia, licensed in 1580. He continued to produce romances written in a highly wrought style, reaching his highest level in Pandosto (1588) and Menaphon (1589). Short poems and songs incorporated in some of the romances gave him high rank as a lyric poet also. By rapid production of such works Greene became one of the first authors in England to support himself with his pen. Greene wrote prolifically, struggling to support himself (and his recreational habits) in an age when professional authorship was virtually unknown. In his notorious "Coney-Catching" pamphlets, Greene fashioned himself into a well-known public figure, by telling colorful inside stories of rakes and rascals duping solid citizens out of their hard-earned money. These stories are always told from the perspective of a repentant former rascal, incorporating many facts of his own life thinly veiled as fiction. He pictures his early riotous living, his marriage and desertion of his wife and child for the sister of a notorious character of the London underworld, his dealings with players, and his success in the production of plays for them. Greene wrote in a variety of genres. In addition to prose romances, Greene composed numerous moral dialogs, and even some scientific writings on the properties of stones and other matters. The dramatist is most familiar to Shakespeare scholars for his pamphlet Greene's Groats-Worth of Wit (full title: Greene's Groats-worth of Wit bought with a Million of Repentance), which the majority of scholars agree contains the earliest known mention of Shakespeare as a member of Elizabethan London's dramatic community. In it, Greene disparages Shakespeare, for being an actor who has the temerity to write plays, and for committing plagiarism. The passage quotes a line which is purportedly from Shakespeare's play Henry VI, part 3, but scholars are not agreed on exactly what is meant by this cryptic allusion: :for there is an upstart Crow, beautified with our feathers, that with his Tygers hart wrapt in a Players hyde, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blanke verse as the best of you: and being an absolute Johannes fac totum, is in his owne conceit the onely Shake-scene in a countrey. Greene evidently complains of an actor who believes he can write as well as university-trained playwrights, alludes to the actor with a quotation from a Shakespearean play, and uses the term "Shake-scene," a unique term never used before or after Greene's screed, to refer to the actor. Though anti-Stratfordians argue that the early date of Greene's remark precludes a reference to Shakespeare (who in 1592 had no published works to his name), most scholars think that Greene's comment refers to Shakespeare, who would in this period have been an "upstart" as an actor who is writing and contributing to plays such as Henry VI, Parts 1-3 and King John, which were most likely written and produced (though not published) before Greene's death. Others argue that it is a reference to another actor, Edward Alleyn, whom Greene had attacked in an earlier pamphlet, using much the same language. Some scholars think that all or part of the Groats-Worth may have been written shortly after Greene's death by one of his fellow writers (the pamphlet's printer, Henry Chettle, being the favoured candidate) hoping to capitalize on a lurid tale of death-bed repentance. Greene's colorful and irresponsible character have led some, including Stephen Greenblatt, to speculate that Greene may have served as the model for Shakespeare's Falstaff. Critical introduction by Edmund Gosse It has been well said that the lyrical brightness of Greene’s smaller poems compared with the tame versification of his plays, is as surprising as ?when an indifferent walker proves a light and graceful runner." Yet the reason is perhaps not very far to find; personally a lover of riotous companions and outrageous surfeiting, this hopeless reprobate was imaginatively one of the purest of idyllic dreamers. There was an absolute chasm between the foulness of his life and the serenity of his intellect, and, at least until he became a repentant character, no literary theme interested him very much, unless it was interpenetrated with sentimental beauty. This element inspired what little was glowing and eloquent in his plays; it tinctured the whole of his pastoral romances with a rosy Euphuism, and it turned the best of his lyrics to the pure fire and air of poetry. From his long sojourn in Italy and Spain he brought back a strong sense of the physical beauty of men and women, of fruits, flowers, and trees, of the coloured atmosphere and radiant compass of a southern heaven. All these things passed into his prose and into his verse, so that in many of the softer graces and innocent voluptuous indiscretions of the Elizabethan age he is as much a forerunner as Marlowe is in audacity of thought and the thunders of a massive line. For the outward part of his prose style he was obviously indebted to Lyly; for the inward character of his poetical matter less obviously, but more essentially, to Spenser, whose antiquated idioms, even, he affected to cherish. The publication of Euphues just preceded his apprenticeship in letters, and without question stimulated him to the production of his first work. He never reached the sententious force and persuasive morality of Lyly’s extraordinary master-piece, but he made this form of literature acceptable to a less exacting taste. His own pastorals enjoyed a very wide success, and were imitated with more or less talent by Lodge, John Dickenson, and other writers of less note. They were delicate blossoms of exotic growth, appealing wholly to a literary taste, and, being unable to hold their ground after the close of the sixteenth century, they were completely swept away by the tide of realistic pamphlets, coarse comedies, and sensational tragedies. It is impossible to regret this, because, although these tales of Arcadia and Silistria were full of sweetness and tender beauty, they were foreign to our native habit of mind, and their prevalence might have doomed us to some such tradition of artificial poetry as the example of Petrarch so long inflicted on Italian literature. The lyrics of Greene show a sense of colour that recalls the masters of Italian painting in the century that preceded him, and it was certainly in the art of the south of Europe that he formed his favourite conception of the brown shepherd and rosy nymph reclining in a whispering boscage of green shadow, to whom appears in vision — : ‘the God that hateth sleep, :Clad in armour all of fire, :Hand in hand with Queen Desire.’ His employment of metre and rhythm were in unison with this golden style of imagery. His metres are very various, and are usually in direct analogy with the theme in hand. Doron glorifies Samela in a stanza that sounds like the tramp of a conquering army, while Menaphon laments the precarious and volatile nature of love in lines that rise and fall with the rush of a swallow’s flight. Towards the end of his life Greene lost something of this metrical elasticity, and adopted for most of his ideas a sober six-line stanza; his only long poem, A Maiden’s Dream, is written in rime-royal. It is not easy to say much of the shorter pieces of Greene which is not also true of all the best verses of the early Elizabethan period. He is the type of that warm brood of poetic youth that still sings in chorus from the dells of England’s Helicon, or the Paradise of Princely Pleasures. Life and the whole world of youthful pleasures attract him with their delight, and he hastens to clothe himself in a gay silken doublet, and to throw away his forefather’s Puritan coat of hodden gray. But anything more specific and definite than this it would scarcely be safe to say. Greene has not Lodge’s individuality of style, nor does he approach his finest flights, but he is more nearly allied to him than to any other of his contemporaries. It will probably seem to a careful reader that his ordinary level of writing was sustained at a higher point than Lodge’s. In his rapid passages of octosyllabic verse Greene sometimes comes very close to Barnfield, and, through that mysterious and exquisite poet, to the juvenile manner of Shakespeare, with whom, as is well known, he cultivated a lively spirit of rivalry. But the most curious and notable thing, after all, about Greene’s poetry is that, in all its sylvan sweetness, it should have proceeded from the lawless bully, whose ruffled hair and long red beard became a beacon and terror to all good citizens, till in the midst of his "villainous cogging and foisting," and all his rascally sleights, he was carried off in the thirty-second year of his life by a surfeit of Rhenish wine and pickled herrings. Upon the poor dishonored head of this strange genius, the wretched woman who was with him when he died set a garland of bay-leaves, in a happy prescience of the tenderness with which posterity would pardon all his sins for the sake of his pure and beautiful verses.from Edmund W. Gosse, "Critical Introduction: Robert Greene (1558–1592)," The English Poets: Selections with critical introductions (edited by Thomas Humphry Ward). New York & London: Macmillan, 1880-1918. Web, Apr. 5, 2016. Recognition 3 of his poems ("Samela," "Fawnia," and "Sephestia's Lullaby") were included in the Oxford Book of English Verse, 1250-1900.Alphabetical list of authors: Daniel, Samuel to Hyde, Douglas, Oxford Book of English Verse, 1250-1900 (edited by Arthur Quiller-Couch). Oxford, UK: Clarendon, 1919). Bartleby.com, Web, May 18, 2012. Publications Poetry *''Poems of Robert Greene and Christopher Marlowe'' (edited by Robert Bell). London: J.W. Parker, 1856. *''The Poetry of Robert Greene'' (edited by Tetsumaro Hayashi). Muncie, IN: Ball State University, 1977. Plays *''Philomela: The Lady Fitzwaters' nightingale''. London: R. Bradock for Edward White, 1592. *''A Quip for an Upstart Courtier''. London: Iohn Wolfe, 1592. *[https://www.archive.org/details/honorablehistori00greeuoft The Honorable Historoe of Frier Bacon and Frier Bungay]. London: Adam Islip for Edward White, 1594; New York: AMS Press, 1970. *''A Looking Glasse for London and England'' (with Thomas Lodge). London: Thomas Creede for William Barley, 1594. *''The History of Orlando Furioso one of the twelve pieres of France]. London: John Danter for Cuthbert Burbie, 1594; London: Oxford University Press for the Malone Society, 1907. *''The Scottish History of James the Fourth. London: Thomas Creede, 1598; London: Oxford University Press for the Malone Society, 1921. *[http://elizabethandrama.tripod.com/Alphonsus.htm The Comical History of Alphonsus, King of Aragon]. London: Thomas Creede, 1599; London: Oxford University Press for the Malone Society, 1926. *''The Complete Plays'' (edited by Thomas H. Dickinson). London: Ernest Benn, 1934. Non-fiction *''Ciceronis Amor; or, Tully's love. London: Robert Robinson for Iohn Busbit, 1597. *Groats-worth of Witte: Bought with a million of repentance: The repentance of Robert Greene. Iohn Hauiland, for Henry Bell, 1629. **(edited by G.B. Harrison). London: John Lane / New York: Dutton, 1923. Collected editions *''Dramatic Works; to which are added his poems (edited by Alexander Dyce). (2 volumes), London: William Pickering, 1831; (1 volume), London: 1858. Volume I, Volume II *''Life and Complete Works in Prose and Verse]'' (edited by Alexander Balloch Grosart). (14 volumes), London: privately published, 1881; New York: Russell & Russell, 1964. Volume I, Volume II, Volume V, Volume VI, Volume VIII, Volume IX, Volume X, Volume XIV *''Plays and Poems'' (edited by John Churton Collins). Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1905. Volume I, Volume II w *''Robert Greene'' (edited by Thomas H.Dickinson). London: T.F. Unwin / New York: Scribner, 1909. Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.Search results = au:Robert Greene, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Feb.18, 2016. Other works *''Mamillia''(pt. 1) (circa 1580) *''Mamillia: The Triumph of Pallas''(pt. 2)(1583) *''The Myrrour of Modestie'' (1584) *''The History of Arbasto, King of Denmarke'' (1584) *''Gwydonius'' (1584) *''Morando, the Tritameron of Love'' (1584) *''Planetomachia'' (1585) *''Morando, the Tritameron of Love'' (pt. 2)(1586) *''Euphues: His Censure to Philautus'' (1587) *''Greene's Farewell to Folly'' (circa 1587) *''Penelope’s Web'' (1587) *''Alcida'' (1588) *''Greenes Orpharion'' (1588) *[http://www.elizabethanauthors.com/pandosto1.htm Pandosto] (1588) *''Perimedes'' (1588) *''Ciceronis Amor'' (1589) *''Menaphon'' (1589) *''The Spanish Masquerado'' (1589) *''Greene's Mourning Garment'' (1590) *''Greene's Never Too Late'' (pts. 1&2)(1590) *''Greene's Vision'' (1590) *''The Royal Exchange''* (1590) *''A Notable Discovery of Coosnage'' (1591) *''The Second Part of Conycatching'' (1591) *''The Black Books Messenger'' (1592) *''A Disputation Between a Hee Conny-Catcher and a Shee Conny-Catcher'' (1592) *''A Groatsworth of Wit Bought with a Million of Repentance'' (1592) *''Philomela'' (1592) *''A Quip for an Upstart Courtier'' (1592) *''The Third and Last Part of Conycatching'' (1592) See also * List of British poets * List of English-language playwrights References *Baskervill, Charles Read, ed. Elizabethan and Stuart Plays. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1934. *Crupi, Charles. Robert Greene (1986) ISBN 0805769056 *Dickenson, Thomas H. "Introduction" from The Complete Plays of Robert Greene (New Mermaid Edition, 1907) *Greenblatt, Stephen. Will in the World (2005) *Melnikoff, Kirk and Edward Gieskes, eds. "Writing Robert Greene: Essays on England's First Notorious Professional Writer" (Ashgate, 2008) *Logan, Terence P., and Denzell S. Smith, eds. The Predecessors of Shakespeare: A Survey and Bibliography of Recent Studies in English Renaissance Drama. Lincoln, NE, University of Nebraska Press, 1973. Notes External links ;Poems *"Content" *Greene in the Oxford Book of English Verse, 1250-1900:"Samela," "Fawnia," "Sephestia's Lullaby" *"Dorons Eclogue Joined with Carmelas" *"The Song of a Countrie Swaine at the Returne of Philador" *[http://spenserians.cath.vt.edu/TextRecord.php?action=GET&textsid=106 Prologue to The Comicall Historie of Alphonsus] *Selected Poetry of Robert Greene (1560-1592) (3 poems) at Representative Poetry Online. *Greene in The English Poets: An anthology: "Sephestia's Song to Her Child," "Samela," "Fawnia," [http://www.bartleby.com/337/157.html The Palmer's Ode in Never Too Late], Song (Sweet are the thoughts that savour of content), "Philomela's Ode," Orpheus' Song (He that did sing the motions of the stars) *Robert Greene at PoemHunter (11 poems) *Robert Greene at Poetry Nook (119 poems) ;Books * [http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/%7Erbear/greene1.html Greene's Groats-Worth of Wit] e-text at Renascence Editions (original spelling). * '' Greene's Groats-Worth of Wit'' e-text at Ex-Classics (modern spelling) ;About *Robert Greene in the Encyclopædia Britannica * Robert Greene at NNDB *Greene, Robert in the [[Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition|1911 Encyclopædia Britannica]] *Greene, Robert (1560-1592) in the Dictionary of National Biography *Robert Greene (1558-1592) at English Poetry, 1579-1830 * Robert Greene (c.1560-1592) at Luminarium * Hayashi, Tetsumaro, A Textual Study of Robert Greene's'' Orlando Furioso ''with an Elizabethan Text, 1973 Category:1558 births Category:1592 deaths Category:People of the Tudor period Category:People from Norwich Category:Old Norvicensians Category:English Renaissance dramatists Category:Alumni of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge Category:16th-century English people Category:16th-century writers Category:Pamphleteers Category:16th-century poets Category:English poets Category:Poets Category:English-language poets Category:Euphuists